Some things you can only see from behind the wheel. I just wish I could get the keys to this Bad Boy…

I’ve been traveling a lot over the past couple of weeks. Well, “a lot” by my standards. I usually travel as much as a person doing 20 years to life in the state penn.

Okay, so I’ve put on a little weight since I’ve been in The Big House. Whatcha gonna do, arrest me?

I’m finally home and have time to kick back and share with you some observations I had while traveling both north and south of where Scrappy lives. Thus I have time to write a worthless totally awesome post jam-packed with useless helpful information for you fellow travelers who are probably back from your summer vacations and sick of traveling, too. I hope you learn something from the things I learned while traveling. If you do, well, then that’s just a bonus neither of us could have anticipated.

Do tell, Lorna! There’s so much I can learn from someone like you. And when you’re finished teaching me, I’ve got a few things I’d like to show you…

If you pack your camera, you really should carry it with you, take it out of its cushy carrying case, and use it to document the stuff you see. If you don’t pack your camera, then at least you have a really good excuse for why you don’t have original pictures to show your family and to post on your blog.

This is a poster of the International Camera Enforcement Officer. He found me and wasn’t happy. Well, you can kind of see that that’s his general disposition. Even frisking me to make sure I wasn’t just hiding my camera didn’t lighten his mood.

Preparing for a long car trips with the man of your dreams by printing off a long list of politically charged questions for you to debate…discuss…agree upon so you can “keep conversation fresh and pass the time” is probably not the best way to begin a relaxing vacation together. There were upsides to all of our wa-ha-hat? arguments…silent incredulous staring matches…adult and civil discussions. We learned a great deal about each other, like how one of us was raised by feral cats (and by “one of us,” I don’t mean me). We luckily found some common ground. We both decided that “texting” while driving is safer than getting a fiscal conservative (not me) and a social liberal to agree on how to “fix the economy” while driving.

Yeah, well, this is just the first prototype. The second one is even better. Any guesses on what the improved version might look like? Let’s just say that those smug smiles, guys, will be gone. At least we won’t see them.

If a “free” Cirque du Soleil show is offered, be suspicious. Be very suspicious. Get the details. Get all the details. You will stand for the entire performance (45 minutes) because seating is very expensive. You will be outside, because inside is very expensive. You will have to arrive (and stand) an hour early to have a hope of seeing anything because tall people with large festive hats always stand in front of you at free events. Finally, the performers may not actually be the best performers because a “regular” performance (held inside for $100 a seat) is showing at the same time. These outside free performers are either: rejects from the real show, injured performers, or random people dressed up in bizarre costumes looking for some action, which could describe a lot of people you’re already standing next to.

Yup. This guy is 6’2″ and totally standing in front of me at every venue I’ve ever tried to see. I think the hat is glued to his head, because it is not coming off…even in a hurricane. He’ll just hover and get a better freaking view.

Some people should re-think a career in food service. We were in an Italian-ish restaurant and a male server was a case in point. He must have formerly been a kindergarten or driver’s education teacher. He spoke slowly and quite loudly, as if his customers were unwilling unable to understand English spoken normally and with their “inside voice.” He kept asking his customers if they wanted “sprinkly cheese” on their food. I thought he was serving a group of little kids. Being a nosy curious person, I had to assess the situation. He was serving several tables. All of his customers were “AARP-eligible” adults. The waiter was also in that age 50-ish range. Everyone in the dining room could hear him converse with his customers; he was speaking so loudly. And slowly. And in simple words. “That pasta looks yummy! Do you want sprinkly cheese on it?” “Oh, it’s you’re birthday? Well, I’m going to bring out a nice piece of cake with a special candle on it just for you! What? You don’t want a candle? Now, come on. I’m an old fart, too, and I still love blowing out a candle on my special day.” “You want another soda? Are you sure you can handle that?” Maybe he was channeling Mr. Rodgers…

Don’t bother with the menu, folks. I’ll just read it for you. Spaghetti is that long skinny pasta that tastes great with sprinkly cheese on it…

When you finally make it home, there’s nothing like a greeting from your pooch who misses you.

There you are! I was just about to go on a Search and Rescue Mission. Let me cut the engines, deplane, and run around in circles. You could help by pulling me out of this contraption.

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I’m lucky in that Phil falls in the middle–he’s fiscally conservative, but liberal on matters of social welfare and other issue that are very important to me. He’s also quite open minded; I try to be open minded, too.

As for the waiter, you may be correct, but it sure was annoying. He sounded so patronizing; that is what got me the most.

I agree with you about rather experiencing my life without a camera lens between me and what I’m seeing. I suppose there is a balance somewhere. I would like to reduce the number of times I say to myself, “Darn, I wish I had my camera!” 🙂

I was away on my own trip and missed this one. I would really like to know how polar opposites can live in harmony…one conservative (not me) and the other socially open-minded and liberal. When I was younger political differences didn’t seem to bother me…but now…ugh!

Maybe that waiter is used to speaking to half-deaf senior citizens and he adopted that annoying speech pattern so he doesn’t have to repeat himself so much. Whadya say…sprinkly what?!

I like your seat belt idea (version 2)… I tend to not take that many photos…otherwise you experience your trip looking through the lens of a camera…not for me. Some people may as well have a camera surgically attached to their face… 😉

I can’t give you a review of the Cirque du Soeil show because we didn’t go see it. Standing for nearly 2 hours outside is not my idea of a fun evening. Free isn’t always worth it.

As for the seat belt design, don’t get too, excited, my friend. That’s just the first design suggestion. The second, new and much improved version is coming out and your wife (and I) will like it a lot better. 😉

I have a wonderful friend who takes care of Scrappy, so he isn’t too traumatized by my absence. But he always seems relieved when I get home. He flashes a Happy Scrappy smile and turns around in circles. It’s so cute!

Nope, we didn’t go to the free performance. When we heard that the event was 45 minutes long, we had to stand and get there about an hour early, we knew it really wasn’t worth it. I many be blonde, but I’m no dummy!

Welcome back home. Political discussions in the confines of a car? What were you thinking!? Glad to see you made it back unscathed from that experience. Now you’ve got me wondering if I was taken by those Cirque du Soleil tickets I bought from this fine vagabond combing the beach er… Cirque employee who fortuitously happened to be walking around right where we were and just happened to have two tickets left. He told us he had to leave and go to the bar to drink himself silly replenish his ticket supply for the next show.

At least the seat belt is a restraining device, and not an ejector seat…

Well, I’d hang around and chat some more, but I better get outta here before my wife smacks me upside the head with that rolling pin, just for liking that new seat belt contraption. 😉

I happen to be the DJ on our car trips. It’s a safe way to travel.
The driver needs to focus on the road. I want to arrive safe. Intense
controversial converstaions could be hazardous to your healh and
survival. The best part is I get to hear the music I like … well .. sometimes,
I add his favorites. ~~~~ : – )
Can’t say I’ve ever forgotten my camera … but … there are times when I’m carrying that it I wish I had. LOLOL
Glad you’re back … I’m sure Scrappy was scared and lonely. xoxo

I’m on board with you with the restaurant servers. If it had been me I might have talked back to the server in the same childish, condescending manner to see how he responded. Geeze, just because we turn 50 doesn’t mean we’re stupid and deaf. Sprinkly cheese? I might have told him there’s no such thing as “sprinkly cheese? – It’s called parmesan.” What an asshat.

Did you really stand outside to see the circus? Tell me no. That sounds like my mom and her groupies using music from a car to line dance at an event they were to perform. What a really desperate situation.

And yeah, I totally get the camera thing. Not packing it, I mean. I hate when I do that.

Right now I’m trying to get my son to read my memoir manuscript. He promises me he will. So far he’s had it a month and gotten through Chapter 1. I think he’s afraid of what he might find out about his mother. 😉

Yeah, I recently read a book called “Total Recall”, which is about establishing an e-Memory and trying to record as much as one can about one’s life experiences so they can pull it up whenever they are trying to remember it (from anywhere) and leave a wealth of information to their family and friends when they die so that generations can know what they thought and felt.

That’s why I intend to have two cameras on me for my next holiday (fortunately, it’s probably going to be NOTOCON in Sacramento, so I have a while to save up): a DSLR and a point and shoot – both with GPS and both with enough memory cards to store everything. And… if I can help it, both on my person when the shooting is good.

That camera thing … oy. I am on vacation now, and yesterday an eagle caught a fish and flew over my head with it in his talons. I got a lovely picture of the blue sky. Not even an eagle-shaped cloud. Sigh.

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL! Well I am just SO HAPPY (that I wasn’t on the trip with you) Hehehehe…Politics? Leaving the camera behind at times? Lorna! What were you thinking….although…MR.BEAN !!!!! Sigh…what a man!!

It’s nice to know there is at least one other couple like us. Phil is my new hero. (Don’t worry, you’re still my blog heroine). We have the same situation here. There’s a social liberal (but a sweetheart of a gal), who was obviously raised by Maynard Keynes himself. And then there’s the deep thinking, profoundly intelligent, fiscal conservative whose revolutionary idea of reinstalling free market capitalism would solve all our problems. We’re just staying together for the dog’s sake.

Where kin I get me one of them there fancy dan seatbelts?

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